


Network Connections

by entanglednow



Series: The Fourth Wall [9]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-04
Updated: 2009-12-04
Packaged: 2017-10-14 17:26:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/151694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entanglednow/pseuds/entanglednow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Castiel comes back, Dean doesn't quite know what to do with him, and Sam brings home a new laptop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Network Connections

  
Six days, it's officially been six days.

"What if something's happened to him?" Dean asks from across the room.

Sam looks up from the paper he's carefully looking through for suspicious activity.

"Nothing's happened to him," he reassures him.

"He's been gone six days."

"He's been gone longer than that before, Dean." Sam rings an animal attack to read through later and looks up at his brother, who's sprawled out on the couch, in some sort of freakish combination of tension, irritation and worry.

"He's always phoned before, God, what if he's-"

"He's not dead," Sam says flatly.

Dean hauls himself up until he can glare at him over the back of the couch.

"I wasn't going to say _dead_ , Jesus Christ, Sam," he says fiercely. "I was going to say 'in trouble' why the hell did you have to go straight for _dead_?"

"I just thought you-" Sam stops when he gets a good look at Dean's expression. "I'm sure he's fine. He's not a puppy, he's not going to get run over in the street."

Yeah, he can tell by Dean's expression that didn't help at all.

Sam gives up, tries to decide if a spate of cat disappearances rate being ringed with the red pen of suspicion. Because what Dean really needs right now is the opportunity to kill something, unfortunately small town America is being strangely uncooperative so far. Considering it's supposed to be the apocalypse things are disturbingly quiet.

But he's not, in any way, taking Dean's suggestion to 'pump Lucifer for information' seriously.

If only because he couldn't stop sniggering long enough to actually say it.

He'd almost forgotten how hard hunting was without the internet. Though Dean said one job, one job and then Sam would get to spring for new technology. It's only because he's been stomping around, schizophrenically swinging between worried, angry and guilty that Sam hadn't brought it up. But, screw it, anything to get out of the motel room for a while.

"I'm going to go pick up a new computer, shall I get lunch on the way back?"

Dean grunts like he doesn't care in the slightest.

Though Sam knows damn well he's as good as promised to get Dean lunch now and if he comes back with nothing he'll bitch about it.

Sam rolls his eyes, grabs his jacket and key and pulls open the door.

It thumps shut behind him.

  
~~~~

  
Dean spends half an hour finishing Sam's job, though he throws his net a little wider. The cat disappearances get a lazy double ring and an arrow because Dean's fairly sure that cat-eating is where it starts. Then he doodles across the face of a smug businessman who looks a little too much like Zachariah for his liking.

Before he leaves it all on the table in disgust and goes to take a shower.

Sam's left his stuff everywhere and no matter how much he bitches about _not_ using girl shampoo to keep his hair shiny and manageable he so does. Though it's clearly not working so Sam should stop forking out money for it.

Dean doesn't even bother drying his hair, he just throws a towel round his waist and yanks open the bathroom door. He'll drip all over Sam's stuff. Sam hasn't had a good bitch about how Dean doesn't respect other people's things for days, it'll do him good.

Though he better bring back food, because Dean's starving-

He looks up, and he barely manages to take in the coat and the insane hair and the carefully blank face before he's across the room, without even registering it, like he's developed his own angel-teleporting powers.

Then he has his arms full of angel.

Angel that starts off hard but very gradually relaxes, goes soft and human- and leans into him.

It occurs to Dean, belatedly, that he's hugging Castiel. In a way that might be described, by some, as over-enthusiastic.

Also, he's only wearing a towel.

And he's still mostly wet.

His determination to act like nothing is different appears to have failed spectacularly.

"Hello, Dean," Castiel says against his ear, voice vibrating all the way through his skin.

He doesn't seem to be in any great hurry to let go. Which Dean takes a second to feel reassured by. Before he remembers that Castiel doesn't really have a lot of experience with the manly embrace they're currently having. For all he knows these things could go on forever.

Dean should probably at least protest, because they've almost definitely been hugging for long enough to have hit awkward and come out the other side. Any longer and even Castiel will start to suspect this is weird.

"I apologise for not keeping in touch, cell phone coverage was difficult where I was," Castiel says slowly.

"Where was that?" Dean asks against his collar.

"The Mariana Trench," Castiel says quietly.

Dean grunts, because that actually seems like a pretty cool place to look for God.

"What was that like?"

"Cold," Castiel says quietly. In a way Dean thinks, maybe, means he's glad to be back.

Someone clears their throat.

Dean just catches sight of Sam over Castiel's shoulder, filling the doorway with his ridiculous limbs, bags and an expression of amusement.

"Shall I come back later?" he asks.

Dean makes a noise and very reluctantly stops hugging the angel. When he pulls away he finds he's left wet patches all over Castiel's shirt and he's flattened his hair down on one side.

It makes him look dorky, and so totally one of them it's not even funny.

"Hey, Cas, I'm glad you're back."

"I'm glad to be back, Sam," Castiel tells him with a little nod, and he sounds like he really means it.

Sam tosses lunch at Dean, who catches it without losing his towel, and sets the box he's carrying on the table.

He looks smug when he flips it open.

"I brought back an internet."

  
~~~~

  
Sam takes himself, and his lunch, to the corner of the room to teach their internet how to walk and speak and ride a bike and all the other things new out-of-the-box internets needed to learn how to do. Before angels could fill them full of porn and maps and recipes for blueberry pancakes.

Dean's perfectly happy with his lunch and his angel, who isn't dead.

"We were worried about you," Dean tells him around his burger. "You usually call when you go to look for God, at least twice a day, usually more."

Castiel's face goes soft with apology.

"I'm sorry, Dean."

"It's ok." Dean nods, easy, like it doesn't matter, like it was no big deal. Completely ignoring that brief period where he was an inch away from clawing off something's skin if he thought they could tell him where the angel was. "Just, y'know, call us so we know you're not in trouble."

"It's sometimes hard to keep track of time as it passes for you. I should have made sure you knew I wasn't silent through lack of choice."

"But because you were at the bottom of the sea," he says.

Castiel nods. "It's definitely not an optimum coverage area."

Dean watches his face, quiet and tired and ever so slightly disappointed, but trying so hard not to be.

"I'm sorry you didn't find anything," Dean says quietly. "Down there."

"It was peaceful," Castiel admits. "Cold and heavy and peaceful."

"And watery, I expect," Dean adds.

The corner of Castiel mouth lifts just a little.

"Yes, it was also very watery."

Dean digs for the last of his fries, wonders if Castiel is hungry, wonders if he even gets hungry or if it's all about the taste.

He's pretty sure there was some candy in his bag but it seems to have gone.

Sam probably gave it to Lucifer.

  
~~~~

  
Castiel restrains himself until Sam goes to do laundry the next morning. Dean's still mostly asleep in his own arm when he hears the quiet bleep of a laptop booting up.

He grumbles amused complaint and forces himself to be awake, rolling over and pushing up onto his elbows.

Castiel is missing his coat and jacket, _and shoes_ this time, He's on Sam's bed, laptop balanced on his thighs. The screen's too far away and too blurry for Dean to be able to tell what he's doing.

Dean kicks the sheets away, drags himself to his feet, he pats Castiel on the shoulder as he goes past, and disappears into the bathroom.

So he figures he has three choices, a) tell Castiel that he's maybe accidentally developed some sort of inappropriate reactions- feelings, towards him, b) ignore the fact that anything's different between them, since it's not like that's going to, in any way, happen in real life, or c) continue to angst in the bathroom like a little bitch about it.

Dean stares at himself in the mirror, toothpaste in a wet swipe up one cheek.

Class Winchester, pure class.

Castiel is still folded over the computer when Dean comes out of the bathroom, pulling on his t-shirt and trailing water droplets and steam everywhere. The angel's staring at the screen with that ever so slightly terrifying intensity that suggests anything that fails to be interesting may very well be smited, on principle.

Cas is weird, awesome, but weird.

Dean kind of likes him like that.

He knows one thing for a fact though. If he tries to pretend nothing is different it will be weird between them. Option b is a car crash waiting to happen. If he doesn't man up and say something it's going to be awkward and he'll end up with the angel thinking the awkward is his fault. Because Cas always thinks the awkward is his fault.

He sits on the edge of Sam's bed, a few inches away from Castiel's foot, which looks strangely small inside its sensible navy sock.

Dean takes a deep breath and pushes the laptop shut.

Castiel looks up, as if he knows the gesture is a plea for attention.

"I have to tell you something," Dean starts. "But it's kind of difficult for me to say and I don't want us to get weird, I don't want us to be weird, Cas." That's the absolute last thing he wants.

Castiel very carefully slides the computer off his lap and turns so that he's completely facing Dean, and Dean can tell by the way he's loose and relaxed that he's being human, as human as he can be.

"You can say whatever you want to me, Dean, I would never judge you."

He believes it, he does. He doesn't for a moment think Cas will be upset, or will, _Christ_ , laugh at him. But still, still- not the sort of thing you can just blurt out.

He thinks of a dozen ways to start what he's about to say, and fails to find a good one every damn time.

If he was an angel he'd just blurt it out, in some sort of weird and bluntly honest sort of way. But at least it would be there. Dean is currently experiencing tragic word fail.

How the fuck does this go in the fanfic?

Ok, no, that's a bad place to go for inspiration, because it's always about six paragraphs from the confession to the sex and Dean is not in any way ready for-

 _What the fuck is he doing just sitting there staring at Castiel like an idiot arguing with his own brain?_

Castiel is still watching him in that expectant but endlessly patient way.

"I have feelings for you," Dean says, and, wow, yeah, he sounds just as much of a girl as he was afraid of. "Non-platonic feelings, for you."

Castiel stares at him.

"For a while now, though I didn't notice at first and I wanted to tell you, so it wouldn’t be- so you didn't think it was anything you did. I thought you should know about it. Should know that I think about you like that sometimes. And that maybe the thought of kissing you kind of scares the hell out of me, but I'm pretty sure I want it so much I don't care." It all comes out in a garbled rush, Dean's amazed it was even that coherent, embarrassing, but coherent.

Castiel is still staring at him.

"I was kind of hoping you'd say something to that," Dean adds, desperately, because that's the sort of thing that needs some sort of reply.

"You already know I love you," Castiel states simply.

Which- _Jesus_ \- is not helping, really not helping.

"But not like this," Dean says desperately. "Not like _that_ , not where you want, really want, with me, sex and all that messed up humanity that comes with it."

"Dean-"

"You don't want that," Dean says, voice half-strangled, and he gets the feeling he's desperately trying to convince himself too.

"Perhaps you should ask me what I want instead of telling me," Castiel says quietly, and Dean loses all his breath in one go.

It takes him three tries to get it back.

"What do you want, Cas?"

There's a long pause, long enough that Dean starts to worry that maybe he's broken him.

"My feelings for you are not entirely platonic either," Castiel says slowly, and the fact that he doesn’t look away for a second makes something tighten in Dean's chest. Like he's admitting something that's been true for a long time, that he'd thought about, but never said anything. Maybe never would have said anything. "I would like to explore the possibility...with you."

Dean can feel his own pulse in his throat. A strange unsteady rush that probably would have made him want to sit down, if he hadn't been sitting down already.

Castiel's frowns, the shape of it small and uncertain.

He opens his mouth then closes it, and that's the first time in a long time he's seen Castiel wrestle with his own thoughts.

"But I'm not entirely sure I can inhabit this body well enough to be responsive to you, not in the same way a human would," he admits, warily, like Dean might be disappointed. "If that's what you want. I don't _feel_ like you do."

He does look away then, for just a second.

Dean feels a little bit like he's been punched, because he doesn't want this to just be about him.

"Cas."

Dean has a hand on Castiel's arm before he realises, and then can't make himself let go. He can feel where Castiel is warm under the cotton.

He's touched him a hundred times.

 _A hundred times._

It shouldn't be any different.

But somehow it is.

"Cas, I'm not asking you to do anything you don't want to do, or that you _can't_ do. I don't want you to be human, or to even pretend to be. This is about you too, about what you want too, or not at all. Besides, real life's not like it is in books, right?" He glances at the computer. "Or in fanfic. It's messy and awkward and it goes wrong and it doesn't end straight after the sex scene. But it's real, it's completely real."

Castiel looks like he wants to believe him, desperately wants to believe him.

Dean squeezes his arm.

"Cas, you don't have to do anything, you don't have to _be_ anything that you're not. I'm not in love with the fanfic version of you-"

Castiel's head tilts very slowly to the side, in surprise.

...

Dean realises exactly what he's just admitted to.

His subconscious gives him a sarcastic round of applause.

  



End file.
